Here and Now
by rosesinjanuary
Summary: Where else would I be?  McGee/Abby
1. Chapter 1

Dear NCIS,

Please, please, pretty please be going where you keep hinting that you're going with Abby and McGee. Because if you're not, it's just cruelty to viewers.

Sincerely,

An Abby/McGee Fan

Hi all! Lots going on in my actual life lately, so I haven't had a lot of time to write. But the most recent episode made me smile, and gave me a smidgen of hope, so I figured it was time to seriously work on this story, which I've had in my head for a while. It's a bit longer than my usual one-parters, and also has a _little _bit more of a plot (and I really do mean little; plot is not my strong suit, so this is a mere sketch of a plot that I put in as a backdrop to the character stuff); I am going to do my absolute best to finish it in a timely fashion. (I know, promises, promises...)

* * *

It wasn't supposed to be dangerous.

Yes, he was undercover. But it practically wasn't even like he was undercover – basically the only thing they'd had to change was his last name. Tim Morris was working a job that Timothy McGee could have had if he'd gone a different way after college.

It was a desk job, and he just siphoned information. Saved it in two places instead of one, hidden away on his hard drive. A couple of nights a week he would "work late" and send everything to her, and then erase his electronic tracks.

So really, there was nothing for her to worry about. And there was _definitely_ no reason for her to be in such a bad mood about it that she picked an argument with him over some stupid aspect of the whole procedure of data transfer, leading to one of the biggest fights they'd ever had, which meant that he left for an open-ended undercover assignment with the two of them practically not speaking.

Which meant that for three weeks their only communication had boiled down to ones and zeros.

Abby wasn't quite sure what led her up to MTAC that night. She was feeling bad about her fight with McGee…and plus, she just _missed _him. Gibbs always supervised him through a tap the security feed during McGee's data transfer sessions, and she just wanted to see him. Even if they couldn't talk, at least she could see for herself that he was okay.

It worked, at first. Just seeing him there, tapping away at a computer just like always, soothed her. "He's doing good," Gibbs told her quietly. "We should have enough to bring him back in another week or so."

_Another week,_ she told herself. Another week and he would be back here, where he belonged, and they could make up, and her world would go back to normal and stop feeling all headachy and wrong. Abby turned and took a step towards the door.

"_Shit."_

Gibbs rarely swore, and this was short, sharp, and venomous. She turned back to the screen and saw Sam Parker, their main suspect, the owner of the company, brandishing a gun at McGee. _Her _McGee, who had on his best innocent expression and was gesturing to his computer, the files he'd been careful to leave open on his desk. She cursed the security feed for its lack of sound.

She cursed it even more a moment later, because in a split second it showed her Parker leveling his gun at McGee, and McGee falling backwards. A quick shot later, and their security feed dissolved into static.

Someone was screaming, and she couldn't figure out who. She could see all of the MTAC techs, they were all looking at her, but it wasn't any of them.

It wasn't until Gibbs grabbed her and shook her sharply by the shoulders, and the sound of the screaming stopped and turned into sobs, that she realized that it was coming from her.


	2. Chapter 2

12 reviews in less than 24 hours? You guys are spoiling me! Clearly I have to keep updating, since reviews make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. I know this one is just a little snippet, but I wanted to say thanks for all the feedback, so here you are! I'm going to try and get another part up tonight, or at least in the next day or so.

* * *

It turned out they weren't kidding when they said head wounds bled a lot.

McGee had known this, of course. He had made use of this knowledge a couple of times in his books. He'd just never actually experienced it firsthand. If he ever wrote another book, he would have to include a fairly long passage about how irritating heavily bleeding bullet grazes were when they were dripping into one of your eyes, or when there was dried blood on your ear that itched like hell, but you couldn't scratch at it because your hands were tied to a chair. Also, he had a splitting headache, his wrists were rubbed raw where they were tied, and his muscles ached from being in the same position for far too long.

But at least if he was bleeding and in pain, he was alive. He wasn't sure if he was alive because Parker meant for him to be, or if the man was just a really bad shot, but the alive part was what mattered. Now he just needed to buy enough time to either get himself out of this mess, or give Gibbs and the team a chance to find him.

They'd find him.

They'd find him faster if his last data transfer had made it to Abby. He'd finally hit the set of transactions they'd been looking for – real estate deals, hidden in about five shell companies, that linked Parker to a bunch of properties they hadn't known about before. New ground to search for evidence, he'd thought.

Now, hopefully, it would be new ground to search for him.


	3. Chapter 3

Okay...third (very short) chapter! My apologies for the shortness, but I wanted to get this up before I'm dragged back in to the craziness of real life tomorrow. Likely not another update until next weekend, though I might manage something.

* * *

Six possible locations. And no guarantee he was actually at any of them.

Abby _hated _guessing.

But certainty required time, which McGee didn't have, and so she input as much data as she had, and then as much more as her team could give her, closed her eyes, prayed, hoped that Gibbs' supply of luck extended to even the scientists on his team…

…and guessed.

She wondered if she would ever forgive herself if she guessed wrong. Or if, in the hours it had taken them to guess as accurately as possible, something had happened to him.

Hysterics were not productive, she reminded herself firmly. Anyway, she hadn't actually had hysterics. She'd had what Ducky kindly referred to as "a natural reaction to a bad shock," and by the time Gibbs had gotten Vance in the loop and Tony and Ziva in the squad room, she'd managed to drink most of a strong cup of tea in Autopsy, and had calmed down enough to go back to her lab and start to sort through the latest batch of information McGee had sent, searching for anything that might lead them to where he'd been taken.

Nobody had to know that her hands shook while she typed, or that when she'd matched the sample of the blood from the office floor they'd brought her to Tim ("A lot of blood, Abs, but not enough to know anything for sure") she'd had to hide in a back corner of her office with her face buried in Bert's grey plush fur for a solid ten minutes.

That could be her secret.

And now they were gone, en route to their best guess of where Tim could be, and she was left with nothing to do but sort through everything he'd sent them, in case she could find any other clues.

She opened up the most recent file, and saw again a funny line at the bottom that hadn't gotten decoded when she ran it though the decryption algorithm they'd been using. It looked…odd, but familiar. It was so short she'd decided that it was unlikely to contain vital information, and so she'd focused on the rest of the file.

Abby pulled up a different decryption program, one she and McGee had been playing with a couple of months ago, but hadn't actually used on anything yet. She ran the one line through, hoping for anything that could tell her that they'd guessed right, that Gibbs and Tony and Ziva would be back soon, bringing Tim with them, and this whole nightmare would be over.

_A - I'm sorry about the fight. I'll be done soon, I promise. Lunch when I get back? - T_

Nobody had to know that she was crying again.


	4. Chapter 4

Bad News: I'm home sick.

Good News: I'm not too sick to write. :-)

* * *

Ziva had once tried to explain to him how pain and fear could gradually break down even the strongest resolve. How eventually, the most beloved country or most respected organization became just words, and one had to rely on sheer stubbornness or anything else available to get through.

Sheer stubbornness had gotten McGee through high school hell, two degrees, FLETC, his first few dead bodies, and his first _year_ of autopsies. Not to mention nearly a decade of being hassled by DiNozzo and head-slapped by Gibbs. But he didn't have Ziva's lifetime of Mossad training, or Tony's endless supply of sarcasm and bullshit, both of which would have been useful here.

What he did have was the ability to make what DiNozzo referred to as "McGeekSpeak" sound technical and realistic even when he was making it up as he went along. That ability – along with a healthy dose of stubbornness – had gotten him through the past few hours, gradually doling out meaningless bits of information that sounded important.

The stubbornness had also gotten him a broken finger, many bruises, and a few more scrapes and cuts, but he was trying not to think about that.

Instead, he thought about Tony, and Ziva, and Gibbs. Binding them all up to the reasons why he wouldn't tell Parker and his men the truth, giving those reasons names and faces and _people_ he would be betraying, instead of just words.

And Abby. He thought about Abby a lot. Because if he didn't give in, he just might get to see her smile again, and for some reason, right then, that smile was the only thing he wanted to see.

He heard Parker talking just outside the door, and he fixed the image of Abby's smile in his head and braced himself – and then he heard possibly one of his favorite sounds in the world: the crash of a door being kicked in, and Gibbs, Ziva, and Tony yelling at suspects.

He could trace their progress by sound. First the scuffle and yelling in front gradually died down. "All set, boss." Tony, which meant they'd probably subdued Parker and his two henchmen.

"Clear!" Ziva's voice, distant. She'd cleared the far side of the house. Which meant –

"All clear," he managed, his voice hoarse, as Gibbs opened the door.

Gibbs relaxed, barely, but didn't holster his weapon. "How many?"

"Three, that I saw. Sam Parker, and two others."

A curt nod. "Clear!" he called over his shoulder. "Got McGee. DiNozzo, stay with Parker." He holstered his gun. "You okay?"

McGee nodded. "I'll live."

Ziva appeared behind Gibbs, and he saw a mix of relief and horror on her face. "McGee!" She crossed the room at a run and in an instant had her knife out and was working on the ropes tying him to the chair.

Gibbs looked him up and down, and McGee could tell he was assessing his injuries. "You hear anything? Any chance they've changed their timetable, that we need to adjust?"

McGee flexed his newly freed wrists and shook his head – and immediately wished he hadn't. "No. They didn't know how much information we'd gotten, or even who I worked for. I didn't tell them."

And there was the ever-so-slight lift at one corner of Gibbs' mouth that signaled approval. He laid a hand on McGee's shoulder and squeezed lightly.

"Good job, Tim. Now let's get you home."


	5. Chapter 5

Still sick. :-(

Still writing. :-)

Next part will be longer, I promise!

* * *

Abby was cleaning.

And organizing, and running diagnostics on her babies, and working through an email backlog. In short, doing anything but thinking about McGee in the hospital, getting stitched up and bandaged and who knew what.

"Don't let them keep him overnight unless they absolutely have to," she'd told Gibbs over the phone. "McGee hates the hospital. So make them let him come home. Arrest them if you have to. _Don't_ make him stay –"

"All _right,_ Abby. We'll take care of it. See you soon."

She felt a little bit like she was living in a snow globe. Her world had been turned upside down, shaken, and then put back the way it was – but nothing would settle back into the same place.

McGee was safe; the important things were back to normal.

But everything else…She still wasn't sure how everything else had changed. And once she saw him, she would know, and she could never _un_know, and she wasn't sure she was ready for that change.

So she was cleaning. And completely failing at not thinking about McGee.


	6. Chapter 6

_Finally_ getting to the good parts. :-)

* * *

McGee hated hospitals. Ever since his car accident in high school, spending any time in them as a patient had topped his list of Things to Avoid.

Though at least this time he had company.

"You really don't have to stay, you know," he told Ziva. She was in a chair nearby, as close as the doctor stitching up his head would allow. "There has to be something more important that you need to do."

Ziva smiled at him, and shook her head. "Do you remember after you and Tony and Gibbs pulled me out of Saleem's camp?" She rolled up the short sleeve of her shirt and tapped a thin scar on her shoulder. "Do you remember where you were when I was getting that stitched up?"

He'd been sitting nearby, as close as the doctor stitching her up would allow. Because she was his friend, and nothing was more important than being there with her.

Through the blanket of numb exhaustion that seemed to muffle everything around him, McGee felt a sharp stab of gratitude.

"Thanks," he said, and Ziva reached out and squeezed his hand.

It didn't make him hate hospitals any less, but it helped.

#

The numbness was bone deep by the time they reached the Navy Yard. Those few moments of relieved exhilaration when he'd finally been rescued seemed like a million years away. He wasn't even sure why they were actually here, other than that somebody would have to drive him home, and they probably had to switch cars…

He wondered what Gibbs had had to promise or threaten to get him released from the hospital, and reminded himself to thank the boss sometime soon.

They'd barely gotten out of the elevator before he saw Ziva focus on something off to his right and look alarmed. "Careful –" she began.

The painkillers they'd given him at the hospital were the only reason she didn't bring him to his knees. He barely got a chance to focus in on her before she collided with him, but he knew her anyway, by the shape of her in his arms and the smell of her hair, and the brush of her lips against his cheek.

And her voice. "Sorry!" Abby said almost instantly, loosening her hold on him. "Sorrysorrysorry…it's just…I was just…I mean I –" She took a deep breath and a half-step back. "I'm glad you're okay." Another breath. "Is there anything you need from your desk? We should get you home."

McGee stared at her, confused, and Abby linked her arm through his. He belatedly realized that she was wearing her coat and carrying her purse and lunch box.

"I'm taking you home," she explained. "Back to your apartment. They wouldn't let you leave the hospital unless you had someone to stay with you, so I said I would. Anything from your desk?"

Slowly, he shook his head, and let her lead him back into the elevator. As the doors closed, she put her arms around him again, carefully this time, and when he held her, he felt a little bit of the numbness melt away.

Abby laid her head on his shoulder and whispered something indistinctly against his neck.

It sounded like "I love you," but he couldn't have heard her right.


	7. Chapter 7

This is the longest continuous writing marathon I've been on lately - usually I'm either tweaking a really short fic over a day or so, or working on a longer one in fits and starts over a few months. It's kind of exhausting...but fun, too! And it's taking my mind off my cold. :-) Thanks for all of your comments! Seven parts down...four to go...

* * *

She loved him.

She _had _to love him, because if anyone else had stepped off that elevator with more bruises than she could count and a splint on his finger and gauze on his head that probably hid a Frankenstein-like set of stitches, she would have been instantly compassionate and concerned.

Instead, she was furious.

It was all his fault: the fear, the tears – and Abby _hated_ people who made her cry –the lost sleep and the ulcer she was pretty sure she was developing, and the fact that she was going to have to listen to him whine about how the scar made his hair grow back funny. For about thirty seconds, she was so mad at him that she wanted to go back down to her lab and leave him to take care of himself.

Nobody else could make her that mad…because nobody else could scare her that badly. Because she didn't love anyone else nearly that much. And suddenly, she wasn't mad anymore, because he was alive, and he would heal, and she was wasting valuable time being mad about this when she should be getting him well and convincing him that she loved him, and that he loved her, so that he would give her plenty more chances to be furious with him over things that didn't matter nearly as much.

So she took him home, and left him lying on the couch with strict instructions not to move unless absolutely necessary while she took the dog for a walk and filled his prescriptions. And worried about how pale and exhausted he'd looked lying there. Not even miserable; it was like he didn't have enough left in him to be miserable. Just…empty. Drained. He wasn't broken, at least not beyond repair. She knew McGee, and he was too tough for that. Just…bent a little. Possibly slightly cracked. But fixable.

He was hers now. She'd give him whatever he needed, do whatever she could to help him heal, because he was hers.


	8. Chapter 8

I hate being one of those writers who leaves a story in progress for months without an update, so please believe me when I say that my real live has been completely hectic lately! I have literally been about one paragraph away from finishing this part for a month and a half, and I've been writing and tweaking about a sentence at a time whenever I _had _time for weeks.

That said, this part and the next two are the reason I started writing this story. It actually started out much darker (and a little smuttier), but I think I like the way it turned out. P.S. If Abby and McGee don't get together soon on the show I am going to _scream._

* * *

He woke up in a foul mood, with the feeling that someone was watching him.

He cracked one eyelid and saw Abby, sitting cross-legged in his desk chair, a book open on her lap. She was toying idly with one of the pages, but she wasn't reading. Just watching him, with that little crinkle above her nose that she got when she was worried about something.

McGee signed inwardly. It had to be her, of course. Of the admittedly few options of people to hang around in case he fell over and ripped open his stitches or cracked his head on the bookcase, it had to be the one person who could always see all the things he didn't want her to see. Like how much everything hurt, and how exhausted he felt. And most of all, how terrified he'd been and how shaken he still was.

Because he couldn't stand for her to see all of that, and he couldn't take her pity.

He wondered how long he had before she realized that he was awake, and decided it was about thirty seconds. So he turned his head – carefully – and opened his eyes, and watched Abby quickly pretend to be completely absorbed in her book. _Deep Six: Rock Hollow, _it looked like, from the portion of the cover that he could see.

"Why are you reading that? That book almost got you killed." He hated it. Hadn't even wanted it published, but his contract had made it clear that wasn't an option. Every time he saw the cover, the image of Grey pointing a gun at Abby filled his head. He only kept a copy around to remind him of the consequences of mixing fiction and reality.

Abby tucked the jacket flap in the pages to mark her place – unnecessarily, since she'd just about made it to page two, from what he could see – and closed the book. "It's good. I don't like the end of this one as much, though."

_You're the one who didn't want McGregor and Amy to get married,_ he thought, but didn't say. "I had to write an ending that didn't demand a sequel, and I was way behind my deadline. I'm just glad I wasn't under contract for any more books."

She frowned slightly at that, but apparently decided that whatever she had to say on the topic, now was not the time. "I thought you'd be more comfortable in your bed, but I didn't want to wake you up. How are you feeling?"

Like crap, actually. Everything was sore, and he had a persistent headache. The worst part was knowing that the remains of the very strong drugs they'd given him at the hospital were still keeping the majority of the pain at bay, and that it would only get worse before it got better. "Fine," he said shortly. Slowly and carefully, he levered himself first to a sitting position, and then to standing. He could see Abby barely controlling the urge to jump up and help him.

"Are you hungry? You should eat."

If she got into full-on caretaker mode, he would lose his temper. "I just want to shower."

Abby did not look pleased, likely because she knew he wouldn't let her sit outside the shower to make sure he didn't have a sudden attack of dizziness and fall over. But she contented herself with a stern "don't get your stitches wet," and went back to reading.

Or pretending to read.

The hot water felt like glory, and for a long time he just stood under the spray, wishing he had better water pressure. Eventually, he began to scrub off the dirt and grime and general disgustingness of the last day. Keeping the stitches on his head and a smaller set on his arm dry was a bit of a challenge, but he managed.

"What are you doing in there?" came Abby's piercing voice through the door, startling him into bashing his elbow on the wall. He bit back an instinctive "ow," knowing it would just bring her running into the bathroom. Why couldn't she just leave him _alone?_

"Writing the next great American novel, Abby, what the hell do you _think _I'm doing?" he snapped.

There was silence on her side of the door. For a minute he thought she'd gone away, and then he heard the faint creak of the board just outside. Just where it would creak if someone were standing there, shifting their weight from one foot to the other. Someone who wouldn't leave, no matter how mad he got.

And suddenly he wasn't angry anymore.

"I'm trying to figure out how to get the rest of the dried blood out of my hair without getting my stitches wet," he said more calmly.

More silence. Then –

"I can do it for you, if you want. In the sink. Once you're done."

He was too drained to argue. "I'll be out of the shower in a minute."

"Okay." She sounded relieved. "I'll get the bandages and stuff."

McGee got out of the shower and dried off, pulling on the pair of pajama pants he'd brought into the bathroom with him. Then he opened the door to find Abby waiting for him, a big bag from the pharmacy in her hands. "I went to get your prescriptions fi-" she began, and cut herself off. "Oh, Timmy," she said softly, looking in horror at the bruises and scrapes on his arms and chest. She reached out one hand as if to touch him, but pulled back quickly. "Go…go sit down," she told him, her voice not quite as sure as usual.

He sat on the lid of the toilet, next to the sink, while Abby got the water to the temperature she deemed appropriate. "Now tilt your head just a little this way."

Her long fingers were gentle and careful as she worked the dried blood out of the hair they hadn't gotten to at the hospital. What was left of it, at least; they'd shaved what felt like a huge chunk around the bullet wound, on the left side of his head. "My hair's going to grow back funny," he commented.

The corner of Abby's mouth lifted ever so slightly. "I know."

Someday, he'd ask her why that was amusing.

Finally she grabbed a towel and started drying his hair. "There. All clean. Hold still and I'll redo the bandages on your stitches." McGee sat obedient and still while she reapplied ointment and gauze and tape, and then took a step back to examine her handiwork. "Better," she decided.

McGee started to stand up and forgot to move slowly, and learned very fast why that was a bad idea when his head swooped and spun sickeningly. He sat back down heavily, hissing a frustrated breath through his teeth and swearing a blue streak while he made a blind grab for something to hold on to…which turned out to be Abby's hip, as she stepped in closer, cradling his head against her stomach. "Shhhh," she murmured. "Shhh…it'll be all right. It's okay." Her voice broke a little on the last word, and after that she just held him.

Eventually it was; his head steadied, and he stood up, careful to move slow this time. Abby kept her hands on his elbows, holding tight. She swallowed hard, and spoke to a bruise on his shoulder. "Don't you ever do that to me again, Timothy McGee."

It felt natural to slide his arms around her waist, and he wasn't in the mood to question why. "I just stood up too quickly, Abs, I'll be more –" And then he saw the thin rim of tears around her eyes, and realized she wasn't talking about his dizzy spell. McGee gathered her in close against him, and touched his lips lightly to her forehead. "I'm fine," he said softly as she buried her face in his shoulder and held him tight, fighting a wince as she hit sore muscles. "Everything's just fine, now."

The stood together like that for a long time, just holding one another. Eventually, Abby tipped her head back to look up at him. "Don't you ever do that to me again," she repeated, and lifted her mouth to his.

He jerked back – only slightly, and only out of surprise, but enough that he saw a flicker of hesitation in her eyes. She leaned in again, more slowly, and this time he tilted his head down to her, just so that their lips brushed.

McGee forgot that his head hurt, and his body ached. He forgot that he'd been shot and tied up, that he was cranky and miserable, the he'd just wanted to be left alone to let the darkness creeping at his edges overtake him. It all faded to the background and his entire world became Abby. The warmth of her mouth, the way her body fit against his, her half-remembered curves and angles under his hands – though who was he kidding, he remembered every inch of her, even years later – the way her fingers curled into the short hairs at the back of his neck and she melted into him, so that he couldn't tell where he ended and she began. He backed her slowly against the bathroom wall, ignoring the aches and pains and the dark in favor of Abby.

She mumbled something against his lips. "Hm?" he asked, though he was paying more attention to the smell of her skin.

Abby leaned back. "You should…rest," she managed, her eyes still closed and her voice unsteady, and there was that crinkle above her nose again. "Eat. Sleep. Something."

He kissed the crinkled spot, and then the tip of her nose, and then her lips. "I don't need to. I just need…" _You, _he thought, but she'd broken the spell, and the darkness and doubt was creeping back again.

He couldn't take her pity.

"Abby," he said, and her eyes drifted open to focus on him. "Why are you here?"

There were tears caught in her eyelashes, but she was smiling, and it was that perfect Abby-smile he'd wanted so badly to see all day. "You idiot," she said softly. "I love you. Where else would I be?"

And she kissed him, and somehow being with her absorbed all the dark.

And he almost believed her.


	9. Chapter 9

"McGee, just take the damn pills."

He frowned at the bottle of painkillers in her hand. "I hate that stuff. It makes me all fuzzy, and I can't think straight."

Abby sighed. The problem with McGee was that he was usually so even tempered it was easy to forget how stubborn he could be. A personality trait he'd been demonstrating for the past fifteen minutes, during which she'd had to remind herself more than a few times that he'd been through hell and that she loved him.

Guilt. Guilt sometimes worked. "C'mon, Timmy," she said, sitting beside him on the bed and giving him her best pleading face. "You won't be able to sleep if you don't take the painkillers. And if you can't sleep, _I _won't be able to sleep, because I'll be worrying about you…and also probably because you'll be talking to me. And I didn't get any sleep last night either. So won't you please take them?"

"Abby…" He sounded cranky, but she could tell he was weakening.

She took his hand and dropped two pills into it. "You need to sleep," she told him firmly, and left him there glaring after her while she went to get a glass of water. "Please?" Abby leaned in and kissed him softly. "For me?" Yes, she was playing on his emotions just a bit. But it was for his own good, and she really would be up all night worrying about him – again.

And he melted, albeit grudgingly. "Fine." She watched while he swallowed both pills and the entire glass of water, and then leaned in again to give him another kiss. "Thank you," she said. "Now lie down."

She turned away, but he reached out and grabbed her hand. "Where are you going?" he asked, his voice…not panicked, exactly, but not as relaxed as she wanted.

"Just to put the glass in the sink, and change into my pajamas," she promised, and squeezed his hand. "I'll be right back, don't worry."

When she came back, he was lying down as instructed, and was starting to look a little less miserable and a lot more sleepy. "Are you comfortable?" she asked anxiously as she sat on the bed. "Do you need more pillows, or blankets, or any more water, or-"

"I'm _fine, _Abby." It was a mark of the drugs' effectiveness that he only sounded mildly irritated instead of full-on annoyed, since she knew she was fussing. "But…" He slid his hand across the blankets and caught a fold of her pajama sleeve – hot pink with black hearts; not her most attractive choice, but she'd been distracted when she was home picking up things for tonight – and tugged weakly. "Stay with me?"

He sounded about ten, and heartbreakingly pathetic, and she realized he could just as easily melt her as she could him. So she curled herself around him, her head next to his on the pillow, careful not to touch any of his bruises or cuts. They lay there, his head turned towards hers, his eyes on her face, and she watched his eyelids slowly get heavy and begin to droop. Just at the moment when she could tell he was sliding into sleep, she kissed him – light and quick, but enough that he smiled as he drifted off.

Less than twelve hours ago, she hadn't known if she'd ever see him again, much less kiss him. Now she couldn't stop.

She lay her hand lightly on his chest, soothing herself with the steady rise and fall of his breathing. Eventually, the slow rhythm lulled her to sleep too.

#

"ABBY!"

The sound of her own name jolted her out of the doze she'd fallen into. McGee was sitting up beside her, shoulders heaving, eyes wide but still blurred with sleep. Abby sat up quickly and slid her arms around him, and he hugged her so tight she could barely breathe, his forehead resting on her shoulder. "Shhh…" she murmured, rubbing his back gently. "It's just a dream, Timmy. It's just a dream, and I'm here, and I'm not going anywhere."

It took longer than she would've liked, but at last his breathing stopped sounding so ragged, and he stopped trembling in her arms. "Sorry I scared you," he said at last, his voice a little embarrassed.

"You didn't scare me." She tried to find the balance between holding him tight and not hurting him, and felt him laugh. Even though it was faint, it was recognizably a laugh.

"Liar. I can feel your heart pounding. My neighbors probably think you're murdering me."

She smiled. "Or that we're having really great sex. Do those same people still live next door? The ones who banged on the door and told us to keep it dow-"

McGee cut her off. "They moved." But at least he sounded amused.

Abby kissed his temple. "I'm going to turn on the light, okay? I just want to make sure you didn't pull out any of the stitches on your arm or anything." He nodded, and she leaned over to switch on the bedside lamp.

No ripped stitches; no apparent new damage. She studied his eyes carefully – he looked exhausted and still a little muzzy from the drugs, but no excessively dilated pupils or anything. "You want to tell me about it?" she asked, peeking up at him out of the corner of one eye as she stuck the tape back down over the gauze.

He shook his head, his eyes focused on her hand on his arm instead of her face. "Not yet." He squeezed her hand, though, and brushed his lips against her cheek. At least he looked calmer now.

Abby switched the light off, and they lay back down, sharing his pillow again. McGee found her fingers in the dark, and she could feel him toying with her hand – so, not sleeping. "What did you do today?" he asked suddenly.

"Worried about you," she answered, perplexed. "Helped the rest of the team frantically search for you. Got angry at you for making me worry, and then worried about you some more. Why?"

He sighed. "Okay, what did you do yesterday? Or any of the days I missed? I just want…normal."

And she understood. All she'd wanted after that whole serial killer incident in L.A. had been a good strong dose of normal. So she kissed his shoulder (still couldn't stop…) and thought for a minute. "Well…did I tell you about the background check Tony had me run on that girl he met at the bar?"

She'd been saving up stories for him since he'd been away, and she went through at least half of them that night. "I missed you so much," she told him finally. "So, so, much. Don't ever go away again." _Or get shot at, kidnapped, or half-killed,_ she added, though only in her head.

"I'll try not to." He was starting to sound sleepy again. "I missed you, too." He squeezed her hand tight. "Tell me more about Palmer trying to help out in the lab."

She continued the story, and kept her voice quiet…dropping it lower as she felt him relax…and, at last, he slept again.

It took a bit longer, but in the end, so did she.


	10. Chapter 10

First of all, my extremely deep apologies for vanishing into thin air! I have been having the weirdest computer problems, one of which is the will let me log on, but I can't do anything with my account once I'm on (like post updates). ARGH. And getting to a computer where I can is a pain in the butt. So I am really really sorry about how long this has taken! I'm trying to haul my computer in in the next month or so for service, which will hopefully fix the problem.

Also, I just wanted to say that all of your reviews mean so much to me. I don't have the time to respond to all of them individually, but please know that I read them and appreciate them, and that when I'm having a crappy day at work I go through them in my email and they cheer me up to no end. Thank you all for taking the time to read my work and respond – it really makes my day!

And finally, the last chapter of _Here and Now…_probably a bit anticlimactic after all this time, but I didn't want to leave it unfinished! Hopefully more to come on _Rule 5 _soon.

* * *

For the second time in less than twenty four hours, McGee woke up feeling like crap.

At least it was manageable crap. Sometime around four he'd gotten up and taken another one of those stupid painkillers and that had knocked him out for the rest of the night. Now he felt that annoying still-slightly-drugged cloud that dulled the pain but convinced him that he could make do with ibuprofen from here on out. The worst of it was past anyway; he could handle some aches and pains if it meant he could think clearly. No matter how much Abby used her big green pleading eyes on him.

Speaking of Abby…he stretched his arm out and realized that she wasn't in bed beside him. It was after nine, he noted as he checked the clock, so it made sense for her to be up, but he couldn't hear anything that placed her anywhere in the apartment. Had she gone home? That thought made him feel worse than the drugs, for some reason. He was already half convinced he'd imagined her in his arms last night. The whole thing felt like some sort of dream.

Then he heard the front door opening and felt a huge rush of relief. Maybe not a dream, then, and at least she was here now. "Abby?" he called.

"Just a second," she answered, and from a jingle and the sound of nails on the floor, he guessed that she was dealing with Jethro's leash. "And don't get up!" she added.

He mostly obeyed her – he didn't get out of bed, but he did push himself to a seated position. It made him feel slightly less like an invalid. It also made Abby frown when she entered the bedroom, but she'd evidently decided to pick her battles. "I called in and told Gibbs you were doing fine, and we'd both be out today, and I took Jethro for a walk," she said as she leaned against the doorjamb. "Gibbs says you're supposed to rest, and he doesn't need your report until Monday at the _earliest, _and, I quote, 'that's an order.' Ziva says to feel better and Tony said something which I couldn't hear and she refused to repeat to me. And Ducky is going to stop by this evening and check on you, which will hopefully save you a trip to the doctor's office later, though they may still want you to be looked at by someone who deals with the living on a more regular basis." She paused for a breath. "And now I'm going to make you breakfast. While you stay in bed and rest. Which is also an order, this time from me, though that shouldn't make you follow it any less."

Abby delivered this flood of information at what he thought of as one-Caf-Pow speed – in other words, normal for most people, but in her case a definite concession to the fact that his brain wasn't back up to full processing power yet – and then gave him a smile and disappeared, presumably to his kitchen.

He didn't want her making concessions for him. He didn't want her feeling sorry for him. He couldn't help being glad that she was here, because without her, he'd be likely to brood on things like various aches and pains, and how the hell he was supposed to type with a broken finger, and whether there was anything he could have done to avoid getting caught in the first place. He'd fall asleep and dream about being back there, tied to that chair, the moment he felt his finger snap, or he'd dream that he hadn't been strong enough, that he'd spilled NCIS' plans and intel, and when he woke up there would be nobody to tell him it was only a dream, that he'd done his job and everything was okay and that it was all over.

It would all pass eventually, whether she was there or not, but it was easier with her there.

So he was torn, because he wanted her to stay, but he wanted…he wanted to know _why_ she stayed. Last night hadn't been a dream, had it? She'd kissed him. He'd held her, and kissed her, and she'd told him that she was there because she loved him. But love meant a lot of different things to Abby. Not always the same thing it meant to him.

Why was she here? What was different? To believe that she loved him and then find out she'd meant something else would break his heart. Even to be this close to that was almost too much, after the past day.

McGee sighed. Currently, Abby's laser focus was on getting him to eat breakfast. Getting her to discuss anything else until that goal had been accomplished would be nearly impossible, especially since he wasn't exactly functioning at full capacity.

He got up and made it halfway across the room before Abby yelled from the kitchen, "I told you to stay in bed!"

"Am I allowed to go to the bathroom?" he called back, not bothering to hide his irritation.

(Which she probably didn't deserve, but he was still tired and in pain and confused and could only think straight for about a minute at a time, and while he liked to believe he was a good person, he was far from perfect.)

A short pause. Finally – "Fine," she said grudgingly. "But then lie back down."

Which he didn't do. After he came out of the bathroom, he headed for the bedroom door, stopping a couple of steps outside. Far enough out that he could talk without raising his voice, but far enough away from Nurse Ratched to be safe. "What are you making?" he asked, his voice wary.

Abby shot him an exasperated look over her shoulder while stirring something in a pot. "Will you just stay in bed? Please? I've promised about ten people, including Gibbs and a couple of medical professionals, that I will make you rest, so don't make a liar out of me." She turned back to the stove. "And it's oatmeal. It'll be ready in a few minutes."

McGee made a face. "I don't like oatmeal."

She was facing away from him, but he could picture her rolling her eyes. "What are you, five? It's good for you, and you'll eat it. Now go back to bed."

He debated the merits of arguing with her, and determined that it was unlikely he'd win, and also, that his head did hurt more when he was standing. Not that he would admit it to her. So he compromised by propping his pillows against the wall so that he was could sit up comfortably. Jethro came padding in a moment later and rested his head on the bed, big brown eyes staring up at his person with a slightly worried expression. McGee smiled and snapped his fingers. "C'mon, buddy," he said. "If I have to stay in bed, you might as well hang out here with me." The big German Shepherd jumped up on the bed and curled up with his back against McGee's leg. McGee was scratching him lightly behind the ears when Abby walked in carrying his breakfast. "Careful," he told her. "Jethro might decide that's his."

"He wouldn't," Abby told him confidently. She looked down at where Jethro was staring fixedly at the plate and bowl in her hands. "No," she said clearly. "Not. Yours."

With a sigh, the dog obediently lay his head back down on his paws. McGee looked down at him and blinked. "How do you do that? If I have so much as a piece of cheese in my hand, he won't leave me alone."

Abby grinned. "Maybe he's still mad at you for shooting him." She handed him the bowl of oatmeal and crawled onto the bed, sitting cross-legged, her knees touching his. "Eat," she ordered.

Resistance was clearly futile. He took a bite. "'s good," he admitted. She'd put milk and brown sugar on it. "I didn't know I had oatmeal."

"You didn't. I want grocery shopping when I filled your prescriptions yesterday."

Of course she had. "What about you? Here, eat some of this. You made me enough for three people."

They passed the bowl back and forth, sharing the oatmeal. Then they started on the cinnamon toast she'd made, alternating bites until all that was left were a few crumbs on the plate and some cinnamon sugar on their shirts. And then…then he just looked at her.

He was tired – still – he ached everywhere, and he was just vulnerable enough to let the question slip out. "Why are you here, Abby?"

She frowned slightly, confused. "I told you, last night. Because I love you," she said. "Weren't you paying attention?"

He wanted to believe her. He really did. "Yeah, but…why now? What's different?" _Not because you think I need you. Please, not that._

Her fingers stretched out, brushed his. "I was _so _mad at you, McGee."

"_Mad?" _McGee stared at her blankly. "Abby, I didn't get caught on _purpose – " _

She interrupted him. "Anyone else, I would have felt sorry for them. But you…I was just so mad at you for almost leaving me." She started to smile. "You really don't get it, do you, McGee?"

Maybe he was starting to. But thinking that you understood Abby could be dangerous. "Help me a little."

"If I have to be that scared, every time there's a chance you might not come back…"

Suddenly, he was very aware of all the points where they touched: her hands in his, their knees bumping against one another as they both sat cross-legged, her breath brushing his cheek.

"…I want all the good stuff too." She leaned in and kissed him, lightly. "Ask me again. Not saying it doesn't protect me at all, it doesn't make it not real, so I'll say it as many times as it takes for you to know I mean it." A smile, there; the one he loved. "Ask me again, McGee. Third time's the charm."

It didn't make much sense, but it made enough, which probably meant they'd been friends too long. McGee didn't care. "Why are you here?"

Her eyes were steady on his. "Because I love you."

And he believed her. He tugged her closer, into his lap so that he could wrap his arms around her, and if it hurt he didn't notice.

"I love you too."

FIN


End file.
